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Friday, March 29, 2024
NEWS  |  CAMPUS

Counseling center to offer support for Web addicts

Tyler Reed, coordinator of UF’s collegiate-league “StarCraft II” team, can play nonstop, skip meals and justify spending seven to eight hours on the computer a day.

“If I wasn’t doing this, I would probably be watching television or raging,” Reed said, “and neither are preferable.”

Reed said he believes Internet gaming like this shares symptoms of addiction.

“You will skip meals,” he said, “especially when you aren’t living at home, and your parents don’t bug you to go eat.”

The Counseling and Wellness Center at UF will offer a new group for students who consider themselves dependent on computer games, video games and the Internet.

The group, called Unplug Yourself from the Virtual World, is free for students and will meet every Wednesday from 3 p.m. to 4:30 p.m. starting the first week in February.

Fred Shueh facilitates the group as a psychology intern at the Counseling and Wellness Center. He said the group aims to provide a safe place to explore issues regarding Internet use.

Shueh said group therapy helps participants in several ways. They realize they aren’t the only ones dealing with the problem. They can hear other students’ stories about how they struggle and how different people deal with their problems in different ways. Finally, group therapy helps participants become motivated to make changes in their lives with the support from group members.

Shueh said the group is set to be inclusive and welcomes all Internet users, including those who chat, shop, use Facebook, play games and more.

Dr. Timothy Huckaby, physician and clinical assistant professor in psychiatry and addiction medicine at the Florida Recovery Center, said Internet dependency is considered a process addiction, which is an addiction to an activity like eating or gambling.

Addictions can interfere with a person’s social life, family, work and school, Huckaby said. People use the Internet as a way to escape their problems and can lose control.

Shueh said many people won’t admit they have a problem with computer use.

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 “I didn’t make this group to merely focus on fixing Internet dependence but to help students understand what is going on and to help them balance their life and their computer and Internet use,” he said.

For more information about the group Unplug Yourself from the Virtual World, contact Shueh at shueh@ufl.edu.

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